Point of Origin
by MidKnight Rider
Summary: This was written for my ultra-awesome beta reader BethanyActually, who said I could share it here. She once asked me for a "Jack and Daniel do lunch" series, which evolved somehow into "Jack does lunch with various members of the team". It is a tag to The Other Guys.
1. Chapter 1

**This was written for my ultra-awesome beta reader BethanyActually. She once asked me for a "Jack and Daniel do lunch" series, which evolved somehow into "Jack does lunch with various members of the team".**

Sam stared at the text message and contemplated whether or not she'd be suspected if Jonas was shot from a distance.

_Sorry, can't make it. Will do next time._

Then she sighed and let it go. She really had come to love the guy, and it wasn't his fault if he didn't get the vitally important role he had to play in being the 'safety valve' in the very complicated relationship she had with Jack O'Neill. And Teal'c was still coming with Jack. So it would be fine.

She leaned back against the car, crossed her feet at the ankles and clicked on the next message, from Jack.

_On my way. Teal'c not coming. Some Jaffa thing._

Sam took a deep breath. _I'll have to shoot them both,_ she thought. Jonas had an excuse; he was new. Teal'c had been the silent observer of what went on between Sam and Jack for six years and he _knew _better. Teal'c understood his role as buffer and he should be there.

So their 'team' get-together for lunch at O'Malley's was down to two of them. All right. Fine. It was the middle of the day at a crowded restaurant that was a favorite place among the SGC personnel. If she and Jack ever decided to have some kind of clandestine affair, O'Malley's would be the last place they'd pick.

Or maybe it would be the first. Jack's expertise in Special Ops might make hiding in plain sight appealing….

With a sharp inhale, Sam shut those thoughts down abruptly because what the actual _hell_ was she thinking? Jack O'Neill was stunning. He was a larger than life hero. He took her breath away.

He was also one hundred percent off-limits.

Sam stood up and jammed her cell phone into her purse, shaking herself in the process.

_Get a grip, __Major_, she thought firmly, just as Jack's ultra-macho black pickup pulled into the parking lot. _It's just lunch._

She forced a professional smile as he parked next to her car and climbed out of the truck.

"Jonas isn't coming," she said, quickly, like ripping off a bandage.

The faintest shadows of _something_ flickered through Jack's eyes and then his expression was carefully neutral again.

"So," he said, gesturing with the sunglasses in his hand, "you want something else? Besides O'Malley's?"

"No, this is fine," Sam answered, uncertain why she was still talking so fast.

"You sure? There's that little Thai place you like not too far from here."

"No, really, this is fine. I already had my heart set on a BLT."

Jack shrugged. "Okay." He made an expansive gesture with his arm. "After you."

Sam smiled again and led the way up the stairs to the front entrance.

(0)

A half an hour later, Jack was spearing the dill pickle off her plate and she was taking the coleslaw cup off his.

"Can I ask you a question?" Sam said.

"Sure."

"Would you have really shot Felger if he'd disobeyed you one more time?"

Jack grunted and smirked as he poured ketchup on his fries. "I was close to shooting him after the second time." He handed her the bottle, meeting her eyes as he did.

Sam made a neat little puddle of it next to her fries, because they disagreed about dipping versus drenching when it came to ketchup. She lifted her eyebrows in response to his statement and he amended, "You know, just to wound, so I could be sure he'd stay in one place. Or zatted him. Whichever."

She studied him carefully, knowing that she was partially smiling at him and partially unnerved by him.

Because Jack was like that. He liked keeping everyone off balance, even his team. Anyone who thought Jack never got angry had never seen him the way he had been in the Goa'uld cell when Felger and Coombs had shown up. Even Sam hadn't known he could get that angry. She had realized with sudden clarity how much crap he had taken from Daniel all those years and how – for all his bluster – Jack had never, ever _really_ been angry with him. Sam had seen a variety of expressions cross Jack's face when he argued with Daniel – usually frustration, mixed with resigned exasperation. He expected Daniel to disobey him, to argue with him. Guys like Felger and Coombs, Jack expected to do what he said.

"Remind me never to piss you off," she said, in an attempt at lightness.

She made the mistake of looking up as she said it and when she met his eyes, there was warmth and affection in them. The armor briefly fell away in the secluded booth at O'Malley's.

"You could never do that," he said, quietly.

It was one of those moments that they'd had too rarely in the year before Daniel's death, and had too often since losing him. It was as if they felt the pressure more now.

As if they were more willing to admit what they were in danger of losing before it ever came to fruition.

Sam chose to break the moment by looking at her plate and gathering up her sandwich. She took a few bites, chewing, swallowing and washing them down with Diet Coke before speaking again.

"You have to admit they probably saved our lives," she said. "In hindsight, your suggestion that only three of us get captured so that we had someone on the outside was probably the way we should have played that."

They were on rocky ground again because Sam knew how Jack felt about the Tok'ra, and his feelings were even more hostile now than they had ever been. Jack hadn't been happy about the entire mission. He'd had no desire to let his team fall into the hands of the Goa'uld, not after his imprisonment by Ba'al. She knew that had been on his mind every moment of their last mission. It had shown in his over-the-top smartassery.

It had shown, she was just now realizing, in the anger he had directed at Felger.

Jack didn't answer, even though she gave him ample time. She let them eat in silence for a bit and then distracted him with a discussion of tactics. She never minded doing that, though. She was learning a great deal from him and he seemed to love teaching her.

"Who would you have left on the outside? Which one of us? No, wait. You aren't going to tell me, are you? You're going to ask me who I would have left."

Jack grinned at her and took a bite of his double cheeseburger. Sam took a breath and thought it through out loud.

"Not yourself. You'd never send us into a situation like that without you. Not Jonas. He's too new. That narrows it down to me or Teal'c, and either one of those is a viable option. But I'm thinking that you'd leave Teal'c, because he understands the way the Jaffa operate better than I do and he's more at risk every time we're captured. So while _I_ would possibly stay on the outside - because I trust you, and I know what I can do if I'm the one responsible for getting all of you out – I'd assign it to Teal'c, because his safety is more at risk." Sam looked up to see if Jack was going to agree with her and then added quickly, "But don't tell him I said that."

Jack sat back in his chair and raised his beer in a salute to her before drinking. When he leaned forward again he asked, "What would you do with Felger?"

"Threaten to shoot him if he disobeyed me again," she smiled.

Jack huffed out a short laugh. "Felger's obsession with SG-1 is way past being cute," he said, "and he crushes on you in particular. If that becomes a problem, you tell me."

"_Crushes_ on me?" Sam said, with lifted eyebrows again.

"Yep," Jack said, "Like a teenaged girl on the Beatles. You're awfully easy to crush on, Carter."

They both let that sentence hang in the air for a moment, breathing it in for all the implications it had. Pink stained her cheeks and she felt the heat of it.

"Like I said," Jack went on, "let me know if he gets obnoxious about it."

"If he gets obnoxious about it, I'll take care of it myself," Sam informed him. She tilted her Diet Coke in Jack's direction and said, "But thanks for the offer," before she drank.

"Then let me know if you want backup," he insisted. "You know, I can hold your coat or something."

"I'll be sure to wear one," Sam answered, because she was learning to keep up with him and she'd stopped being intimidated by him years ago.

Jack grinned at her, dark eyes warm again. "You want dessert?"

"I was thinking about it," she said.

"How about if we go to that ice cream place you like?" Jack asked.

The fact that Jack seemed to know all her favorite places was an intense turn-on for Sam, one she had to firmly ignore.

"Isn't there a place _you_ like?" she asked.

"Um...well, there's that donut place on Fountain Boulevard-"

"The one where they fill any donut you want with whatever you want?" Sam guessed, instantly interested.

"That's the one," he agreed.

"Yeah, let's do that," she said, pushing her empty plate to the side and reaching for her purse. "Get the checks and we'll go get a dozen to take to your place. There's a hockey playoff game tonight, isn't there?"

Jack shrugged. "Jersey versus Tampa Bay, not a matchup I care about, but we could watch."

Sam frowned at him as she slipped out of the booth on her way to the ladies' room. There wasn't a hockey matchup Jack didn't care about, not as far as she knew anyway. He was either mildly interested or vitally invested. She knew he was excited about the idea of watching the game and eating donuts, because when all was said and done he was a man who loved simple things.

As for Sam, she would never truly be satisfied when earthbound. She'd always want to be out among the stars, even if it meant being hip deep in trouble. She wanted to go faster, farther; she wanted to push past boundaries of speed and distance and just keep going.

But she needed to return to her point of origin, to rest and reset and Jack understood that in ways she didn't.

He caught her hand as she walked past him. Instinctively, her fingers tightened. "What?"

"One check, okay? I'll treat."

Sam hesitated, but honestly, what harm was there in coworkers treating each other to lunch occasionally?

"Sure," she smiled, squeezing his hand before letting go. "Thanks."

(0)


	2. Chapter 2

Jack followed Sam's sleek gray Volvo in his over-sized black pick up and tried to resist calling Teal'c to see if he could come and join them at the house for the game.

Because honestly he loved spending time with Carter – _Samantha_ – but it really helped if there was someone else around to block the _oh god I really want you _vibes that erupted like some emotional mushroom cloud of doom when he and Sam were alone.

Teal'c was good at it. He understood the complications even if he didn't agree with them. Daniel, typically, didn't understand, didn't agree. Daniel, Jack knew, thought that he and Sam were complete and utter morons for just not screwing the rules first and each other second.

That notion derailed Jack's thoughts – Daniel _had_ thought, hadn't understood, hadn't agreed. Daniel had loved them both but Jack knew Daniel had always been about an inch from smacking both of them upside the head.

Daniel was gone and now there was Jonas. Jonas was proving fun to have around. He was nice, he was loyal, and smart. _Very_ smart. He smiled a lot but Jack never went to visit him in Daniel's office, because it was always going to be Daniel's office no matter who sat in it.

Jack had no idea if Jonas had picked up on the mushroom cloud vibe.

He should try to get them both to come to the house for the game so that Teal'c could watch over them knowingly and Jonas could drink Coors in blissful oblivion.

They stopped at the donut place and parked side by side. Sam got out of the Volvo with her hair glinting in the sun, a shining beacon of hope and temptation. She was so impossibly beautiful and all he could do was drink it in like a man dying – like looking at Sam was the very last thing he would do in this lifetime. He had only a few moments before she straightened and turned.

Jack hoped his sunglasses were covering most of the desperate look. He waited, savoring the scent of Sam-flavored air, while she locked the car and then turned to smile at him. Jack was pretty convinced that every time Sam Carter smiled a new star was born in the heavens.

_Get a grip, O'Neill, _he thought. He let the corners of his mouth twitch back in a small return smile.

Inside the donut shop they ran head long into a couple of more things they didn't exactly agree on. Jack went straight to the chocolate donuts topped with crushed Lucky Charms while Sam was already ordering the Cinnamon Toast Crunch on a twisted glaze with Bavarian crème filling. Jack insisted that she try the jerky bacon topping and was stunned to discover she didn't like it at all; and vanilla wafer topping? The place was a candy shop for donuts. Amy's Donuts was the place that had ended Jack's relationship with Dunkin' Donuts. It was possible to eat one's self into a food coma here and Sam was going to use one her six selections to get vanilla wafer topping on a banana cream? Okay so she got the chocolate drizzle on top of it, but still. It sounded way too much like health food to Jack; just like the carrot cake and cream cheese one.

They wound up with only two that they both agreed on – pumpkin pie with the house glaze sprinkled with cinnamon and stuffed with whipped cream and cookies and cream stuffed with 'fluff'. Jack wasn't sure what fluff was, but it was delicious. He caught her staring at him with undisguised horror when he ordered the jalapeno glaze with jalapeno cream cheese filling and topped with sliced jalapenos. He tried to look stern and failed as it dissolved into the kind of grin he hadn't smiled in years.

Sam did that to him – made him smile again.

The cherry fritter was almost as big as his hand. Sam's zebra iced blueberry was a work of art. As a bonus, Jack got two dozen glazed donut holes.

When they drove to his house, Sam followed him. Jack was anxious to get to home, to start an evening of uninterrupted Sam-time. He loved having her in his house. It was simultaneously the most exciting thing in his life and the most terrifying. He wished having her there didn't feel so right and so perfect. It was like he could give her everything that had weighed him down for so long and she could help him carry it.

There was about twenty minutes between his house and Amy's Donuts and he had never realized how long those minutes were.

They were really, _really_, long.

He was too old to feel this off balance. He sat in the truck for a few minutes waiting for her to pull up beside him. It was all the time he needed to gather the donuts and his scattered brain cells.

Taking a deep breath, Jack got out of the truck and fell into natural lockstep with Samantha as they walked up to his front door.

(0)

**A/N: Amy's Donuts is a real place and those are real choices. Their Facebook page is usually pretty funny. The continuation of this story is only because of the many readers who asked for it. So thanks. ;-0**


	3. Chapter 3

They each had a donut while Sam poured Diet Coke into a plastic cup and Jack rifled through the fridge and pantry, gathering potatoes and carrots, an onion, and a bottle of red wine. He tossed her a package from the freezer and said, "Here, defrost that, would you?"

She caught it and turned it around in her hands. "What is it?"

"Meat," he answered.

"Well that's helpful. What kind?"

"Beef, for stew."

"You know how to make beef stew?"

Jack straightened up from the fridge and kicked the vegetable drawer shut with his foot.

"I'll have you know, the cabinet full of mac and cheese and Top Ramen notwithstanding, I actually can cook. You're just lucky enough to be here on a day when there's food in the house."

Sam blinked at him for a moment. "You're going to cook for me?"

"No, I'm going to cook for us. Man does not live by donuts alone."

She grinned as she tossed the package in the microwave and found the defrost setting. "Not something I thought I'd ever hear you say."

"Just don't tell Teal'c."

Sam had a huge smile on her face by that time. Her eyes were warm and affectionate, genuinely pleased, genuinely relaxed and happy.

It was a good look for her.

"So who do you like in the game tonight?" Sam asked.

"Jersey," Jack answered.

"Are you kidding?"

She sounded baffled, so Jack turned to give her his full attention. "No. Why?"

"Well, first of all," she began, and Jack winced. Multiple points. He was so screwed. "The Devils haven't scored first all season," she went on, "and look how Tampa Bay is playing. They learned their lesson after last season. Brad Richards is playing with more confidence and he's not the only one. Lecavalier is better. So are Martin St. Louis and Fredrik Modin. And besides, Jersey is just boring. They can't find the net."

Jack was almost openly laughing by the time she got done. "And here I didn't think you paid attention to the games."

Sam ducked her head and looked a little sheepish as she opened the microwave to fuss with the package inside. "If I'm hanging out with you guys all winter, we're watching hockey. So I see it."

Jack was suitably impressed. No wonder he was in love with her. If he was good enough for her, that would just about make everything perfect.

They worked side by side in the kitchen for a while, peeling and slicing. She had lovely capable hands, and when she was standing almost shoulder to shoulder with him, it was safer to focus on them than on anything else.

They got everything into the crock-pot and set it on high. As she wiped her hands on a paper towel, Sam asked, "Could we start a fire?"

Jack frowned. "Are you cold?" It was late September in Colorado Springs. Jack had been living there long enough not to really feel the cold anymore. Sam was wearing a gray sweater over her jeans and he had thought she would be warm.

"I'm a little chilly," she admitted. "It's officially fall now. As it gets dark a fire would be nice."

"Sure," Jack said, ignoring the part of him that was questioning the wisdom of a warm meal, alcohol, a donut-induced sugar high and a warm, crackling fire. "I'll go bring in some firewood."

"I can help," she said.

"No, how about you go find out how much kindling is still in the box and let me know if there's enough?"

"Okay," she said, brightly.

(0)

The living room was full of signs that Jack O'Neill lived here – an empty beer bottle on the coffee table, kicked-off hiking boots at the bottom of the stairs, the sports page casually strewn over the couch. Sam checked the old wooden box on the hearth and found it full of strips of dried pine. Then she took the empty bottle to the recycling in the kitchen. She refreshed her cup of Diet Coke, picked out another donut (despite knowing she was going to regret the extra calories when she hit the gym the next day), and returned to the living room. She put his boots out of the way and picked up the paper, folding it back into some semblance of order.

When he came back inside Sam tried not to stare. She'd been trying and mostly failing to not stare all day. From the spot she had claimed in the corner of the loveseat there was a perfect view as he bent over to stack firewood, smooth worn-out jeans molded over perfect glutes.

Catching her breath she looked away quickly. It would help if her CO wasn't incredibly striking from just about any position – tall and lean, with a face that was always young and full of mischief in spite of the spiky, graying hair. Funny, charming – god, he'd had the twenty-something with the pixie haircut and lip piercing at the donut shop giggling two seconds after starting to order; the same girl who had been slightly put out by Sam's very sensible donut selections.

"Game doesn't start for another couple of hours," he said, after getting the fire going to his satisfaction. "Movie in the meantime?"

"Sure," she agreed.

"Die Hard?"

"Yeah, that works," Sam said. Nothing horribly romantic – just a hero doing everything he could to reconcile with and save the woman he loved. She distracted herself by kicking off her shoes and curling her legs under her while Jack found the movie.

"Or you know, we could watch Beaches." He commented, looking through a box of old VHS tapes.

Sam snorted as she tried to swallow, and Diet Coke went up her nose. She coughed for a moment as he watched anxiously. Her face felt hot suddenly and she was sure she was blushing, for no good reason whatsoever. "Die Hard is fine," she said, setting her cup on the coffee table and wrinkling her nose at him.

He went into the kitchen and came back with the box of donuts and a beer. To her relief he sat down in the single chair across from her, balancing the beer and taking a bite of half the cherry fritter.

The sunshine outside began to dull, fading behind gathering storm clouds. A few minutes later, there were the sounds of rain hitting the roof and deck and the wind rustling the trees along with the fire snapping and crackling. Sam grabbed a throw pillow and put it under her head, stretching out on the couch. When she glanced at Jack, he was watching her with an expression of warmth in his brown eyes.

There was nothing like Jack's house, like being surrounded by 'Jack-ness'.

A long while later she said, "I always forget this is a Christmas movie."

"I'm not sure it exactly qualifies as a Christmas movie," Jack answered. "It's not exactly It's a Wonderful Life. It happens on Christmas Eve and that's about it."

"Well he does reconcile with his wife at the end, that's very Christmas message-y," Sam observed, sitting up and reaching for her soda.

Jack looked away from the screen and said, "After two hours of him kicking the shit out of terrorists? Who cares if they reconcile? The payoff of the movie isn't the thing with his wife. It's John McClane dropping a bad guy off a skyscraper. But he does write 'ho ho ho' on a dead guy's shirt, so there's that."

This time she didn't quite have the cup all the way to her mouth and when she laughed, soda went everywhere. "Oh, crap," she said, sitting up all the way and watching as liquid dripped off her sweater and onto her jeans.

"It's okay," he said, getting up. "Stay there."

He vanished into the kitchen and returned with clean dish towels. He bent over her, his face a combination of amusement, concern and guilt. Sam was pretty sure she could watch his face forever.

"Your jeans are…wait. Here." He started patting her thigh with a towel and then stopped, pulling his hand back. "Here….maybe you should." He handed her one of the towels and then knelt down to begin mopping at the couch. "I didn't mean to make you spill stuff."

"It's okay," she said, dabbing at her sweater. "You'd think I'd be used to you by now."

Jack paused, with his face much too close to hers, looking at her intently. "I don't want you to ever just get used to me," he said, softly.

It was so dazzling that all Sam could do was freeze, hyper-aware of everything – the rain, the fire, the movie playing in the background, Jack breathing, the warmth of his body and the way he smelled, clean and sharp.

She didn't quite know what to do when Jack put a hand on the back of her neck and pulled her closer. There was the slightest hesitation and then they were kissing.

Jack's mouth was soft and undemanding, touching hers with tender care, and it was so peaceful, so blissful, that for a moment Sam didn't register what was really happening.

She'd always thought that when they finally kissed it would be sudden and spectacular, with thunder and fire and tears. This was just soft and wondering and almost surreal.

When they stopped they rested forehead to forehead for a moment and she put her hand on his wrist and squeezed.

He was waiting for her to say the next thing and she finally did.

"Sir," she whispered.

Jack's breathing stopped for a moment and then he exhaled on a weary, resigned sigh that somehow had a hint of rueful smile in it too. "Sir."

"Yeah," she said, with deep regret.

Jack leaned back, took the towel from her and said, "I'll go get you a dry shirt."

"That'd be nice," she said.

Jack got up and as he left the room, Sam thought that there was so much she should say, so much she should tell him. She started to call his name and it stuck in her throat because she could never quite make 'Jack' slip out of her heart and into the air. She started to speak to him and stopped because she couldn't stand the look of surrender and loss she'd see in his eyes.

She sat back on the couch and took a long breath as the tectonic plates of their relationship rocked and shifted and resettled. She thought she knew what was happening, but it couldn't happen now. It might be true love but even if it was, it would have to wait. If it was true love it would not be denied.

Jack came back into the room and gave her a plaid flannel shirt that looked fairly new. She stood up and took it from him with a grateful smile. Their fingers brushed with a tiny sizzle of recognition.

As she went to the bathroom to change Sam thought, Yeah, it's probably true love.

And if it was, eventually it would win. Because true love would never take no for an answer.

(0)


End file.
